[The following is a dream I had last night.]
I was in a basement with two rooms. It was no ordinary basement; it had a loft of marginal size-perhaps a half-floor- narrowly placed between the basement and the upstairs. I was reading a book that taught the way of life. As I opened the door to the large basement room I saw a dark-maned lion rushing down from upstairs. With two leaps the dark lion was upon me. His powerful jaws wrapped around my neck, I could feel warm breath and piercing teeth protrude into my skin preparing for the final blow and the first taste of blood.
Almost as quickly as the dark lion was upon me he was gone. I weakly turned to see why my life was spared, only to find the dark lion engaged in battle with another. Ferociously the two contorted, tangled, and twisted. During a moment of brief pause the new lion urged me to go run. As the dark lion and my defender raged, I ran to the downstairs loft and barricaded myself. No sooner had I blocked the only entrance to my loft than the lions parted; my defender thrown under a table, I saw the dark lion pace back and forth his yellow eyes set firmly on mine.
Cornered and cut off from the way of life, the dark lion began to reason with me. With the smell of deceit on his breath I listened as he urged that he was my friend, not my enemy. “Do not judge a lion by his mane,” he implored. He said he brought the way of survival: something far superior to the way of life I had been reading. That his way was stronger and more reasonable was seen simply in my defender, now curled up under a table unable, or unwilling, to bring me to salvation, my enemy proclaimed. At times the dark lion even seemed playful; as if I was part of some game.
But when my barricade almost failed the dark lion lunged at me, throwing his massive paw into the gap, nearly slicing into my chest; his only goal to devour me. I wondered when my defender would come to my rescue, as I sat stuck in the middle between a basement of lions and my peaceful freedom above.
